The rep confirmed to me that players will be able to use the new multiplayer framework to find games incorporating mods but, better yet, all XP earned in these games will stay with your character.

I hate to be pessimistic... no what am I saying, I was born to be pessimistic ... but I can already hear the wheels of "how much exp exploitation can I pack in my mod" whirring away madly as we speak...

Having clocked more than 500,000 sales for 2009’s universally-loved indie ation-RPG Torchlight on PC, the developer hit the big leagues this week with a place on CES’s Microsoft keynote stage and confirmation of an XBLA version.

While the console outing has received a complete UI and control overhaul over the PC smash, Runic’s rushing towards a “May” launch of Torchlight II on PC, replete with online co-op, overland areas and more.

A few blips to highlight:

Quote

Are you going to be keeping the sidekick mechanic for Torchlight II?...

Max Schaefer: Absolutely, and we’re going to expand on it considerably. The pets were a universally popular addition, and we want to go a little bit further this time, have more pet options and maybe give them some more abilities as well.========================Can you play the whole game in co-op? Is it four-way co-op?

Max Schaefer: It’s entirely soloable, so you can play as one person. We haven’t set the party maximum just yet. The sweet spot, just from playing in the office, is 1-4 players. There’s no technological reason why we can’t increase that, but once you get up to, like, eight players, it gets ridiculously crowded if you’re at all in the same area.

It is possible to have a group of four in the late game and then another group of four in the early game in, technically, the same game session and you just never see [each other]. It works fine. It’s an ongoing debate right now where we set the maximum number of players in the game. It’ll probably be between four and eight.=========================Will the campaign itself be longer?

Max Schaefer: Yes. We’ve got considerably more content than we did in Torchlight. We’ve got multiple hub cities, vast overland areas and lots of lots of dungeons.====================================While you’re changing the physically scenario of the game, I assume you’re overhauling the classes as well. Are you keeping the classes from Torchlight and adding more, or are you starting again?

Max Schaefer: We have four new character classes, and you’re not going to be able to play the old classes any more. Those old classes will be in the game as NPCs and still part of the world lore, so you are still in the same world.

We’re starting where Torchlight’s story left off and you’re going to see some of the same NPCs that you saw the first time around, but we wanted to get away from the notion that we’re tacking on multiplayer to Torchlight. We wanted to emphasise that we’re making a completely new game, so there’s all-new skills and all-new character classes. There’ll be four character classes this time.=======================Care to share any of the classes?Max Schaefer: We’ve already revealed the Railman, who’s sort of a tank with engineering skills. As per the lore, he’s out building these railways across the dangerous and monster-strewn wilderness, so he’s both got to be able to build things and fight off dangers. He’s sort of a mellee tank, but he also has engineering skills, which are pretty cool.

The other one we’ve already talked about is the Outlander. He’s a sort of wandering magician, ranged fighter type of character. The idea is that he’s not part of any structured society; he’s a lone wanderer. He’s sort of a magic, ranged counterpart to the melee tank of the Railman.

He also says normal skill will be a bit more challenging -- they purposely made it easy in the first game so people used to W,A,S,D keys could get used to a Diablo style click-to-do-everything mode; and system requirements shouldn't be substantially higher, just a bit higher in terms of when several people are in a co-op game. They have no desire to charge people for co-op play or microtransactions or anything else.

He has some fun observations about how while he's eager to play Diablo III whenever it comes out, he doesn't envy the expectations the D3 team has to deal with or the number of years they have to work before seeing a finished product.

Glad you posted that info Blackjack. I was considering getting the XBLA version if it's 1200 pts, but with 1-4p co-op coming in Torchlight 2 in May I'll probably just skip the 1st for that. I'll probably still get TL1, but I have so much to play right now I really won't be ready for either until May. Besides, they'll probably overprice TL1 at 1600 pts on XBLA, which is more than $20 here in Canuckistan.

I doubt Torchlight 2 will be on XBLA anytime soon, I'm assuming May is PC only. Surprised on the new (non-item based) pricing, as I thought in the past they'd implied they were going that route, which would be in line with Perfect World, who bought Runic Games. Surprised, but happy.

Torchlight II introduces randomized outdoor areas throughout the game, in many sizes. We have broken down our outdoor areas into two different types: Passes and Overworld areas. There are multiple Passes and Overworld areas in each Act of the game. All offer random dungeons, random events, and lots of exploration for players.

I love randomization and I can't wait for TL2, but... I hope it's a little more deep than it felt in Mythos. Some of the randomization in Mythos just didn't seem to play out as well as one might have hoped. I can't exactly put a finger on it, but even with the randomized stuff some of the paths felt redundant, particularly in the outdoors. I think HGL suffered from this as well, I think it stems from using the same mapsets over in different locations. I realize randomization is a tough nut to crack, but I still marvel at how well Diablo 2 integrated it in. There are areas in the game that I've played probably hundreds of times, yet I don't feel like I've fully memorized the map, and they don't feel redundant. I guess what I'm saying is that the randomization works best if the mapsets are fixed spots and not reused multiple times.

Since Runic's Max Schaefer worked on Diablo I/II, you may be curious about his thoughts about the Diablo III stuff of late... (I'd have put this in the D3 thread, but much of this pertains to Torchlight II).

What do you think of the Diablo 3 auction house and the RMT aspect of it?

It's something we thought about back in the old Diablo days as a way for people to have a more-secure transaction for all the items they were selling on EBAY. I'm not sure how I feel about it today - there are pluses and minuses. I'm glad they are doing it, though, because it serves as another point of distinction between Diablo III and Torchlight II.

Did you consider any systems like that in Diablo 2?

Not in Diablo 2, but as a result of the item auctions on EBAY for Diablo II items, we began to consider it.

So what about Torchlight 2 which you are currently working on. Will that have any auction house style of trading?

No. Torchlight 2 is taking the opposite approach and opening everything up. We will ship development tools with the game with which you can just make any item you like (as well as mod the game however you want.) This choice precludes having an actual worldwide economy of any kind.

Did you consider any RMT aspects to Torchlight 2 trading or other features? Why or why not?

No. Instead we chose to give our players the most flexibility possible. Online, offline, LAN play, and development tools. We will stay a one-time low cost purchase. I think both approaches are legitimate, though, this is just the path we're taking for Torchlight II.

Regarding the always-on connection Blizzard are employing, the DRM in Diablo 3. What are your thoughts on that, the no single player or LAN options?

I will confess I don't know all the details, but it seems that most of what they are doing is related to trying to keep a truly secure, cheat-free economy in Diablo III. Whatever you do, you have to make sacrifices. We sacrifice a cheat-free environment to give players the most options, they are sacrificing options and flexibility for security of the economy like you would in an MMO. I understand their approach and sympathize with the technical difficulties of what they are trying to do.....By the way, I think that there really is no meaningful distinction between Diablo 3 (or Diablo 2) and an MMORPG. By my reckoning, it is one, but that's been my position for a long, long time.

It's a really interesting interview, lots of good, tough questions imho. I think we all already know this, but if you want a "secure" Torchlight, you'll have to wait for the MMO. T2 seems more akin to Titan Quest, although I suspect it won't be "powered by Gamespy."

A little disappointing on the lack of a fixed economy in TL2 but I can see how it keeps in line with the more casual based nature of the game, plus it's one less thing for them to work on and develop, and as mentioned, they can worry about it once it's in full MMO mode. Personally I prefer a closed economy system but I guess it's nice to have an alternative.

Once the game is out, I'm thinking anyone interested can make characters with names like Jarjaritt-GT and on an honor based system play that character only solo or with other -GT people so that you can kind of create your own closed off economy. Just a thought.

With D3 so close is there even a point to TL2? Even if it's a 6 month gap, I would need a compelling reason to invest serious time in anything else while we wait.

GIven Blizzard's reluctance to release anything I'm pretty sure we'll be playing Torchlight2 long before Diablo 3 is released.

I don't think TL2 is being designed to have anywhere near the depth and longevity that D3 intends, it's still going to be a casual gaming title. This is not to say it's not going to be a great/fun game, but they've pretty much made it clear they are using it as a stepping stone (more or less) to the eventual MMO, one that can be released without years and years of development time. If I can get even a couple months solid play out of it I'll be absolutely thrilled, plus I'm sure there will be tons of mods that extend the games' playability.

yeah, I'm more interested in T2 than D3, which I'll worry about once I finish D2.

Same. I'm still stuck in that stupid jungle level.

LOL Diablo haters coming out the woodwork. I seriously cannot understand how someone would like Torchlight over Diablo. But then I also have a huge issue with Torchlight art style which brings it down a few notches.

yeah, I'm more interested in T2 than D3, which I'll worry about once I finish D2.

Same. I'm still stuck in that stupid jungle level.

LOL Diablo haters coming out the woodwork. I seriously cannot understand how someone would like Torchlight over Diablo. But then I also have a huge issue with Torchlight art style which brings it down a few notches.

nah, I'd personally love playing Diablo 3, but the always online thing and real-money auction house kinda kills the idea for me.

there's a definite difference there, but Torchlight reminds me of WoW, and I've always been fond of WoW.

[edit] plus T2 should be cheaper if they keep the 20 buck price point. seeing how I didn't finish D2 I'd rather spend 20 bucks on a game I'm pretty sure I'll finish than 60 on another game I probably won't finish.

« Last Edit: August 15, 2011, 07:40:04 PM by CeeKay »

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I really think Path of Exile might just be the sleeper hit in the action-RPG genre, as long as they don't do anything too crazy prior to release. They've got the "serious"/dark art style of Diablo but with higher quality graphics, along with full persistent/closed servers. All for the incredibly low price of.... FREE. Even from the few hours I played in beta, I wouldn't hesitate to pay full price for the game.

Fans of this genre are FINALLY getting the next gen games we deserve, it only took 12+ years!

Loot stealing in multiplayer games won't be an issue because drops appear differently for each player. In other words, the loot dropped on your screen isn't the same loot that drops for another player, which elegantly trims out the potential for unchecked ninja looting. There isn't a trading interface in the game right now, so to trade you'll need to drop an item after initially picking it up to share with the group.

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Loot stealing in multiplayer games won't be an issue because drops appear differently for each player. In other words, the loot dropped on your screen isn't the same loot that drops for another player, which elegantly trims out the potential for unchecked ninja looting. There isn't a trading interface in the game right now, so to trade you'll need to drop an item after initially picking it up to share with the group.

This has pretty much become the standard for a while now. Hellgate, Darkspore etc. I think Diablo 3 is the same.

Loot stealing in multiplayer games won't be an issue because drops appear differently for each player. In other words, the loot dropped on your screen isn't the same loot that drops for another player, which elegantly trims out the potential for unchecked ninja looting. There isn't a trading interface in the game right now, so to trade you'll need to drop an item after initially picking it up to share with the group.

This has pretty much become the standard for a while now. Hellgate, Darkspore etc. I think Diablo 3 is the same.

Even though this is a solid game mechanic that makes sense, I kind of will miss the old ninja looting style. It added a strange element of edge/excitment to everything, even in shared games with your most trust friends. You still wanted to be the guy that got to and ID'd the uber drop first, even if it you knew it would end up going to your friend.

SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Runic Games, Inc. ("Runic Games"), a specialized developer of PC-based interactive entertainment software in the United States, made two announcements this morning in conjunction with the Penny Arcade Expo 2011, beginning today in Seattle.

Runic Games unveiled the price point for Torchlight II today, and as promised, the studio continues to champion the model of affordable games with great value. Torchlight II will retail for $19.99 USD, the same price as the original Torchlight

“It’s always been our goal to provide exceptional value for the price,” says Max Schaefer, CEO of Runic Games. “Everyone who wants to play Torchlight II will be able to comfortably afford to do so, and they’ll be able to play with their friend online or via a LAN, or play single player offline, all with no further purchases.””

Runic Games also announced the fourth playable class of Torchlight II, the magic-wielding Embermage. The mysterious Embermage joins the previously announced Engineer, Outlander, and Berserker classes. This marks the culmination of a month long buildup introducing each class to players.